Horrothia Effects Lutz Fuzz
Horrothia Effects returns to the channel with the Lutz Fuzz — the most feature-packed fuzz pedal Tom Oakes has ever built. Welcome back to Edge of Breakup.
In this episode the Horrothia Effects Lutz Fuzz takes center stage — featuring the Grez Guitars Mendocino Junior with P90 pickups, into the Benson Amps Monarch 2x12" via the Boss Waza Tube Amp Expander.
Follow Horrothia Effects: https://www.instagram.com/horrothia_effects/ Get a Lutz Fuzz: https://www.horrothia.com/
Also on the channel:
Horrothia Triage Ge: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W88EC9NrCOo&t=4s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KvVNIhJvXBU&list=RDKvVNIhJvXBU&start_radio=1&t=2s
Horrothia Berkeley Uni-Vibe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAyNQVsQdSg
At its core the Lutz is a two-transistor fuzz — the simplest, most archetypal circuit in guitar electronics. Tom Oakes' approach on the Lutz is to take that minimal circuit and add every meaningful control variable a fuzz player could want without adding a single feature that doesn't serve the tone.
Two 12-way high-pass filter switches — one pre-fuzz, one post-fuzz — create a 144-way filter matrix. Every combination of input and output filter settings produces a distinct frequency balance feeding and leaving the fuzz stage. Explored from 05:02 with the full range covered.
Two "curly cable simulator" switches on the top edge add the dulling capacitance of a curly cable — to the left simulating a shorter cable, to the right a longer cable, center position off. These subtle tone changes interact with the filter matrix and pickup impedance in musically useful ways.
The Bias knob sets the voltage bias of the fuzz transistors — start at 50% for the most musical range. Lower bias gives broken, spluttering, distressed textures (explored from 06:36 and 13:30). Higher bias gives more gain and sustain.
The Voltage Sag control lowers the voltage and current fed to the circuit — simulating a dying battery. It rolls off top end and adds compression and squash, explored from 07:59 and 12:22 as a creative tone tool rather than just a malfunction simulator.
Three footswitches: Bypass (relay), Buffer (switches a JFET input buffer in/out — boosts gain and sustain when on, explored from 15:10), and Cap Defeat (removes the power capacitor from the circuit, allowing the circuit to self-oscillate at some settings for drone notes and sound design textures — explored from 06:36 and 15:41). Volume control has enormous range — unity at most settings is around 25%.
Sold out within hours. Check the Horrothia website for future batches.
🎛️ Horrothia Effects: https://www.horrothia.com 🎸 Grez Guitars: https://www.grezguitars.com 🔊 Benson Amps: https://www.bensonamps.com/guitar-amplifiers
Subscribe for more boutique tone explorations.
🎸 Grez Guitars Mendocino Junior | P90 Pickups 🎛️ Horrothia Effects Lutz Fuzz | 2-Transistor | 144-Way Filter Matrix | Curly Cable Sim | Bias | Voltage Sag | Cap Defeat | Buffer Footswitch 🔊 Benson Amps Monarch 2x12" | Boss Waza TAE
Recording: Universal Audio Apollo x4 | Ohma Ribbon | Lauten Audio LS-208 | Royer R10 & R121 | Ableton Live 12
